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My Sick Plants!!

Kevvy

Kevvy

This is an all too familiar problem on this site but im really becoming frustrated and sad at the performance of my plants.
After reading countless posts on chilli growing and trying many of the suggested remidies,no matter what i do nothing seems to work.

My problem is i have a Bhut Jolokia and a Trinidad Scorpion in identical 25lt (6.5Gal) pots both have been recieving the same treatment sine they were planted and they are now dropping flowers and leaves especially the scorpion at an alarming rate dozens of dropped flowers a day.
Now also new small leaves and small just formed flowers are dropping.
im at my wits end trying to work out whats wrong and it's killing me watching these plants suffer this way.

This has been my watering and feeding log since early november, measurments are included and i only watered with nutes when the plants needed water.

Nov 5 Epsom Salts 1 tbl sp in 4 Gal Water
Dec 3 Trace Elements 1/2 oz in 2 pints water, 1 pint each plant.
Dec 16 Potash 1/2 oz in 19 pints of water each plant got a light watering. No water out of pot drain holes.
Dec 21 Trace Elements as above
Dec 24 Water
Dec 26 Worm Tea mixed 2 pints worm tea with 6 pints water
Dec 27 After a Ph test of the soil with a reading of close to 7 i decided to try and correct it buy using Iron Sulphate. 1/2 oz around plant and watered in.
Dec 28 1/2 strength seasol.
Dec 29 No water Checked with a moisture probe and decided not to water even though it's over 95f today.

i think i may be over doing everything even water but the temperature here for the last 2 days has been 95f so im sure for the next two weeks the plants will just drop even more flowers.
Can sombody give me some advice please.

Scorpion Leaf

Sick01.jpg



Scorpion Plant

Sick02.jpg


Dropped Scorpion Flowers

Sick04.jpg


Bhut Leaf

Sick05.jpg


Bhut Plant

Sick06.jpg


Looking at the photos of the Bhut the plant looks healthy better than the Scorpion but like i said it's dropping very new leaves and flower buds.
Am i expecting too much from the plants?
These are my first superhots and was hoping for a bumper crop so to speak.
Here is what my diagnosis is after doing all i have above.
1. Ph is too high.
2. It's too hot in summer here (Perth. West Australia) for chillis to expect bumper crops.

Oh well, any info or advice will be very welcomed.

Cheers, Kevvy.
 
Prob over watering them. If you are concerned with the heat, you need to either put your plants in the shade or inside your house, when the temp is over 90 Only water your plants when the soil is dry or near dry
 
Check your ph, not only your leaves but the stems look lighter in color.

Too much water with a combo of poor drainage plus high heat can cause root rot.

I also agree with megahot, if you could the relocate the plant(s) into partial shade during the hot spells then you can cut back on watering, which also helps prevent mineral loss in the soil

Greg
 
On you log you posted, when did the problems start, before Nov 5, ie were everything you've done since then trying to fix a problem?
You don't seem to be over watering if that's the case, only once per week or a little when adding something to try fix the problem.

Suns been harsh recently, all mine have been moved under a tree so they only get direct sun from 7.30am to 12pm. Then again even though mine are nice and green and no problems (except for aphids), they're a lot smaller than yours due to less direct light (but I've added no ferts, and only deep water every 2 weeks - except for a very light misting of the foliage on really hot days like today). Some of your leaves look like sun damage like mine get if out in the hot sun all day and they wilt to the point they are burnt.

All I can suggest is your soil/potting mix may be poor, high pH, poor drainage (or even not hold any nutes or water if it's hydrophobic, like most soils and mixes are or end up like here, I have to use a soil wetting agent a lot). But if you think the soil and drainage is good, then you have to guess some type of pest or mite doing the damage.
 
The only thing Im seeing there is root zone temps and lack of an even nutrient regimen. Those plants want more food, oxygen exchange, and cooler root zone temps. A few things will fix this: Revamping your soil, transplanting into larger containers, and feeding them what they need.
 
+1 with the other comments!!

I drilled holes around the sides towards the bottom as well the bottom to make sure the drainage is adequate. You can tell if they're holding on to too much moisture by the weight of the potted units. I'm using the same pots and mine are light enough that a child could pick them up. I watered the roots every rainless day at high noon. I do know that 95°F stresses them and they're going to drop their flowers. When the temps lower down to the mid 80°F the flowers will stop dropping off.

I would be careful not to tinker too much with the soil, it may not help as much as you would like. So at this point water/temps are probably the biggest factors you have to deal with at the moment. It would be interesting to see what happens when they are more in line with the needs of the plants.
 
They look like mine did when they were to wet Let there feet dry... weigh the pots if you need to, to find out how much water there retaining.
 
Thanks for all the advice guys.
Heres what i did today. i got some cheap beach umbrellas and have them set up to shade the plants during the hottest part of the day.
Next i drilled more drain holes in the bottom of the pot that previously had none just five along the bottom edge.
No water for the seconed day, will let them dry out a bit.
How long can they go with no water?

Pablo_h
The problems started about a week before xmas been trying to fix since then, i do think the soil ph is too high did a test for a reading of 7.
Will let the plants dry a bit before trying to correct ph.
Any suggestions on how to reduce the soil ph? thats what i used the iron sulphate for on dec 27.
Will adjusting my water ph help that reads at 6.5 - 7
Any way thanks again everyone, will keep you posted.

Cheers Kevvy.
 
What soil/potting mix are you using, and any additives?

My first plants were seedlings I bought in feb this year. I just chucked them in big pots with just a bag of general purpose potting mix. They did well for 3 months, but I struggled to keep them alive over winter/spring.
One died a month ago, 1 I gave up and threw away this week.
Either they picked up a disease or mites did them in.
Or, most likely, It was just a bad potting mix with poor drainage, and even adding all the treatments in the world wouldn't save them. One had some weird fungus or mold in the pot, cleaning it off and transplanting into the ground didn't save it. The other was transplanted into a larger pot with a better mix for 2 months, even that couldn't help it. When I pulled it out the other day, more than half the roots were brown, less than half were white.
So just a guess because you haven't mentioned it, you have got some generic potting soil that isn't very good.
Rather than throw money on it like treatments, ferts. if the above is the case, I'd pull them out of the pots to have a look at the roots, see if they are still a healthy white, and it would give you a good idea of how well the drainage with that mix really is by how wet/moist the bottom is compared to the middle and top of the potting mix.
If the roots look OK, maybe repot them with a decent mix and add some perlite and coir/peat/vermiculite.
 
Pablo_h said:
What soil/potting mix are you using, and any additives?

My first plants were seedlings I bought in feb this year. I just chucked them in big pots with just a bag of general purpose potting mix. They did well for 3 months, but I struggled to keep them alive over winter/spring.
One died a month ago, 1 I gave up and threw away this week.
Either they picked up a disease or mites did them in.
Or, most likely, It was just a bad potting mix with poor drainage, and even adding all the treatments in the world wouldn't save them. One had some weird fungus or mold in the pot, cleaning it off and transplanting into the ground didn't save it. The other was transplanted into a larger pot with a better mix for 2 months, even that couldn't help it. When I pulled it out the other day, more than half the roots were brown, less than half were white.
So just a guess because you haven't mentioned it, you have got some generic potting soil that isn't very good.
Rather than throw money on it like treatments, ferts. if the above is the case, I'd pull them out of the pots to have a look at the roots, see if they are still a healthy white, and it would give you a good idea of how well the drainage with that mix really is by how wet/moist the bottom is compared to the middle and top of the potting mix.
If the roots look OK, maybe repot them with a decent mix and add some perlite and coir/peat/vermiculite.
Click to expand...

Your spot on there.
I am using a generic potting mix, and trust me wont be using again.
Pulling the plants seems a bit drastic as i do have about a dozen peppers on each plant, and i would like to get a few ripe peppers this year.
I think i Will try and nurse these ones through and make a much better potting mix for my new seedlings i have and try to get them through winter.
When i drilled holes in the pots today potting mix dropped out of the holes so i guess from that it's not too wet.
Will see how less afternoon sun and water goes.
Thanks Pablo_h

Kevvy
 
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